The campus is located in the periphery drawing students together from all around the city. However, it is challenged by a high-speed highway impacting safe access to the site, flooding risks, and limited space for gathering. Despite this, students spend an average of six hours a day on campus, taking classes, studying, connecting with faculty and each other, and participating in recreational activities. Recognizing this, the design team saw the need for an environment that extends beyond the traditional walls of the classroom, prioritizing collaboration spaces that make campus living a transformative experience.

Responding to the Site

Chiclayo is a popular destination in Northern Peru, known for its proximity to the Pacific Ocean and its role as a regional center of commerce. Even though the city is located in a tropical zone near the Equator, Chiclayo has a warm and very dry desert climate and every seven to fifteen years the El Niño phenomenon causes massive flooding and temperatures to exceed 35°C (95°F). Despite the impact these conditions have had on the site, the university has weathered them with temporary fixes, and is now looking toward more lasting solutions.

The university owns a second, undisturbed, off-site parcel with a footprint of roughly 120,000 square meters, almost three times the size of the main campus. Its natural state lends itself to become a resource for the main campus’ functionality and resiliency. Although they are not adjacent to each other the design team sees a future potential for connection between the two through sport and recreation activities once the main campus’ implementation is completed.

After an in-depth analysis, Sasaki uncovered opportunities for resilient strategies to permanently and effectively protect the sloping site from flooding as well as other opportunities to add shading and improve safety between the campus and its immediate surroundings. Today, accessing the main campus requires most students and faculty to dangerously cross a high-speed highway, an infrastructure challenge that the master plan made a priority to resolve.

These findings revealed opportunities for the master plan design to rebalance the main campus’ spatial priorities by integrating new programs dedicated to support student life and indoor and outdoor study and collaboration areas.

Connected by a Campus Linear Park

To ensure institutional goals were met, Sasaki defined a set of design principles that focused on increasing enrollment through high visibility and impact, protecting the safety of students through green buffers and stormwater management strategies, and supporting student life through the integration of new and existing structures to create a fuller experience of campus.

These design principles gave way to a master plan shaped by a central green spine that reorganizes the campus around a continuous outdoor experience. A looped circulation system runs alongside it, linking every new and existing building and program to encourage movement across campus. At its center, a new student center anchors campus life framing this area as the true heart of the USAT campus. Around it, plazas and shaded gathering spaces support the informal learning and social interaction that students already seek out, while new and existing structures are woven together through this shared open space.

The central spine also provides a landscaped buffer along the highway edge that softens the boundary between USAT and its surroundings, announcing the university’s presence while shielding it from traffic and noise. Stormwater and drainage strategies are built into the landscape itself, allowing the sloping site to manage flooding through a below-grade cistern and rain gardens, while shade structures and layered planting create more outdoor spaces that are usable throughout the day. Leveraging the existing building’s locations, the central spine spreads out into outdoor plazas that are defined by new and existing buildings forming unique clusters that continue to promote collaboration and well-being.

Anchoring Campus Life

Architecturally, ground floors along the central spine are designed to open directly onto it, blending indoor and outdoor activity so that collaboration spills out of classrooms and into the landscape. Together, these strategies give USAT a cohesive identity, one that ties existing buildings to future growth under a single, resilient framework. 

Anchoring this model are key new additions to campus: a new entrance experience, a series of shade structures, and the new student center, among additional academic buildings each strategically located to support the master plan’s goals.

Near the campus entrance, a set of the academic and admissions buildings stand tall to establish the visual impact and announce USAT’s presence to the highway, drawing in visiting prospective students and families as they approach. Just below it, a new entry plaza sets the campus back from the highway and creates a safe drop-off area, setting a welcoming, deliberate entry for accessing campus, directly addressing the highway adjacency safety concerns.

As the anchor of the master plan, the student center is strategically designed to be the heart of campus and provide multipurpose programming to encourage collaboration and connection among faculty and students. Its placement creates an outdoor plaza that frames the central campus space as the focal point of daily life. This building marks the project’s first phase of implementation, with design development kicking off in 2026 as Sasaki and USAT continue their partnership.

Looking forward with Campus II

A conceptual plan for the university’s neighboring Campus II envisions large outdoor spaces for a tree nursery, sports and recreation programs, along with the return of a USAT medical facility, a service lost during the pandemic. Following implementation at the main campus, the team sees potential for real estate development on a portion of Campus II, which would financially support the main campus’s maintenance and continued growth.